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Friday, December 4, 2015

Come Over to the Mead-ian Side of the Force

Mead. Yes, let's get the title of this one out there because it is important to have in this conversation. I like mead. I like the combination of wine and honey. I can not understand, however, how it gets thrown in with beer, but it is, and that is fine with me. It is the black sheep of the beer universe, but I think it has a lot of good points that need to be revealed. It is less of a black sheep and more ugly duckling that grows into a beautiful swan.

Iniquity - Moonlight Meadery

Mead as a group have some differences from beer. Mead is higher in alcohol content than beer, usually running at 10-15% per container and is served in a much small container than beer. The one thing about is that is They are also sweeter than beer, taking the sugar from the grapes and from the honey, kind of taking the alternative side to beer, rather than competing with it.

It is also harder to find than beer. A whole page of beers may be countered by four, at most, of mead and generally only one. Wine is a much better market for grapes and only a few types of grapes, like Cabernet Sauvigon and Chardonnay, plus combinations of red and white wines in between, make the wine market a strong sort to crack. Mead often finds itself the odd fellow looking in. One of the challenges with maintaining a mead line is that it can not
share a line with any other alcoholic beverage. It has to be all mead,
all the time, otherwise it will not work.

One brewer in the Washington, DC area that offers mead (there are others in Virginia, such as Mad Fox Brewery, and Maryland) as a regular beverage on the menu is Meridian Pint in the Columbia Heights neighborhood. Iniquity by Moonlight Meadery (23 Londonderry Road, Unit #17
Londonderry, NH, 03053 V: 603-216-2162 F: 603-216-1602 www.moonlightmeadery.com) is the currently resident. There is not information on ABV or IBU on the website, but the on the menu it was listed at 12% ABV. The web had a the following information:

A sinful double play on the senses. A semi-sweet and smooth apple that
leads us into temptation with a finish of light, tangy cranberry.

On Untappd, the smell was key to the alcoholic content of this drink. The wine was obviously very good, which is so key for a mead and the rest falls into line. The wine did not run off with the flavor, but rather roped in the taste. All in all, it was very good and worthy of a second glass. (Nope, I didn't have a second glass, but it was tempting!)
I scored it a 4.5 on Untappd.
I will be recording my experiences with mead alongside with beer. Their maybe some interesting experiences to be gained here and I think we need to reflect them along with those of beer. This is going to be good!